BIG CON NEO-CONS: Soon Blair will face appointment with the truth
socialist
Sunday Herald - 14 September 2003
Soon Blair will face appointment with the truth
What we think
ANOTHER week of disclosure and another layer comes off the political
onion that is Iraq. After four months arguing about an Alastair Campbell
confected row about "BBC lies", the centre of political gravity is
at last returning to the one and only real big issue: were we misled
into going to war against Iraq? It is now clear that the prime minister
over-ruled warnings from the intelligence services that an invasion of
Iraq would increase the danger of terrorist attacks. The advice from
the joint intelligence committee was quite clear and to the point: any
collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime would increase the probability that
chemical and biological weapons could find their way into terrorist hands,
including al-Qaeda. No ifs, no buts. According to the intelligence experts,
there was a considered risk in mounting a military operation to unseat
Saddam. At the same time, they conceded that there was scant information
about the Iraqis' holdings of weapons of mass destruction. Don't attack
Iraq, was the message, go for al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Faced with this information, the prime minister chose instead to back
the US plans to attack Iraq, using as his justification that by not
acting the dangers remained and that he had to make a decision based
on his own judgement. It was his call and he was going to make it his
way. Unlike the joint intelligence committee (JIC), which can only produce
considered evidence based on what it knows at that particular moment,
the prime minister has to assess that information and act on it.
Leaders can accept or ignore intelligence presented to them. During
the second world war Winston Churchill famously over-rode intelligence
assessments or used privileged information to outwit his US allies.
All well and good you may say, but Tony Blair told us that Iraq's threat
to the region and British interests and personnel, down to the 45-minute
canard, was not his assessment but that of the intelligence services. So
how can he also argue that he was right to ignore their advice not to
attack Iraq? The simple answer is that this is New Labour logic. To
hell with the arguments, do what you think is right, and as he told the
Commons in March "time will tell whether it's true or not true". There is,
however, another fundamental problem with the advice Blair was given in
terms of assessing the case for war in Iraq. The JIC is not appointed
by parliament; it is a creature of the prime minister. Its business is
conducted in secret (as no doubt it has to be), it refuses to publish its
sources and prime ministers retain the right to withhold information which
they do not want to reach the public domain. All in all it is a deeply
conservative institution at the heart of the body politic. Even when
it made its findings clear in the now infamous Iraq dossier the result
was such a mixture of misleading statements, over-simplified technical
information, plagiarised facts and editorial interference that it has
ended up being deeply flawed evidence.
In the midst of this muddle the losers have been the people of Iraq. Yes,
the war was won cheaply and quickly. Yes, the world is a better place
without Saddam. But against that, Iraq is fast imploding into a failed
terrorist state, its infrastructure is shattered and it will take years
to repair and there is evidence that al-Qaeda units have moved in to
take up residence. Can this really be what Tony Blair wanted when he
joined President Bush's crusade against Saddam Hussein?
It is becoming increasingly clear that Blair's judgement was wrong and that
the JIC was right in claiming that an attack on Iraq would exacerbate the
terrorist threat, not lessen it. By using the security services information
selectively, as thankfully we now know, Blair leaves us with no other
conclusion other than that he took us to war for dubious political reasons.
Once again, and with something approaching a tedious monotony, we remind
readers that this really is at the heart of the Iraq affair and the
problem with Blair. As the next few weeks unfold we are likely to see a
prime minister increasingly exposed by the Hutton Inquiry and politically
isolated at home and abroad.
The great Bush-Blair "Boys' Own Adventure in Iraq" looks increasingly
like ending in their own political graveyards. Watch this space.
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